In recent years, so-called "snack-size" candy has been brought to market. This snack-size candy is smaller than the traditional full size candy bars and candy and presents something of a challenge with regard to vending the snack-size candy in vending machines. The snack-size candy typically is packaged in a plastic foil package approximately 1 inch wide by 3 inches long. These snack-size candies often have irregular shapes and sizes. The smallness of the packages and the irregularity of the sizes and shapes of the packages makes it difficult to vend these smaller candies reliably in the same vending machines used to vend larger, traditional candy. Also, it is generally inefficient to dispense small candies from machines designed to vend large candy.
It has been known in the past to vend one or a small number of very small candies in a screw-type machine. This is the traditional "gum ball" machine in which one would place a coin and a turn a handle to both deliver the coin to a coin box and to dispense one or a small number of candies from a large hopper. This type of device generally is poorly suited for dispensing snack-size candy because of limited capacity of this type of machine and because this type of machine tends to be bulky. Also, these screw-type machines do not present any selection capability, i.e., they require a separate coin mechanism for each type of candy to be dispensed.
In the vending of Packages of gum, it has long been known to provide a rotary or drum-type vending machine. Examples of these are found in U.S. Pat. No. 1,075,527 of Whitmore for "Vending Machine", U.S. Pat. No. 1,081,212 of Collins for "Vending Machine", and U.S. Pat. No. 1,121,804 of for "Gum Vending Machine". These type of vending machines generally have a number of trays (bins) which are disposed in carousel fashion about a rotating drum so that by rotating the drum a desired tray of gum can be brought into cooperation with a coin box. While these devices are generally suitable for use with gum packages, they are poorly suited for use with snack-size candy because the trays are generally of fixed dimension and fixed geometry. That is, the trays are designed to accept packages of a known shape and size. Irregular and odd shapes and sizes would tend to jam in these types of machines. Also, these types of trays provide limited visibility of the packaging of the individual snack-size candy and the machines typically have a limited capacity.
Accordingly, a need yet remains for a vending machine which is suitable for use with snack-size candy and which is compact, operates reliably without jamming, has a large capacity, and provides good visibility of the packaging of the candy in each tray. It is to the provision of such a vending machine that the present invention is primarily directed.